With their first pick in the 2024 draft, the Orioles took a big swing on a player with power potential in Vance Honeycutt. They went in almost the exact opposite direction with their second pick, grabbing University of Virginia shortstop Griff O’Ferrall at #32.
O’Ferrall was given this five-second summary on the MLB Network draft broadcast: “The glove stands out. You’re getting the glove and you’re hoping the bat comes.”
This quick profile stands out immediately upon looking at O’Ferrall’s stats from college, because he hit two homers in 58 games as a freshman, one homer in 65 games as a sophom*ore, and five homers in 63 games as a junior. The Athletic’s Keith Law noted that the four extra homers were the result of a swing change that wasn’t all that successful:
He tried to get all launch angle-happy and pull the ball for more power, instead of using the whole field, losing 86 points off his OBP for the sake of four extra home runs ... The swing is very forced, like he’s trying to catch the ball and lift it out to his pull side, when he’s already shown strong contact skills and has enough strength to hit for average in pro ball with plenty of doubles. He can still play above-average defense and at least continued to make contact at a high rate, striking out just 7.4 percent of the time this spring, so there’s at least some floor here for a team that takes him and tries to restore his old swing.
That sounds like a negative report, and it is, but Law actually had O’Ferrall rated right where the Orioles took him, at #32 on his own list. MLB Pipeline had him in the neighborhood as well, at #38. Baseball America is not a believer in the profile, having him down at #115 on its ranking, writing:
While he finds the barrel, he mostly hits soft line drives and the ball dies off his bat with wood, with very little power upside to project on moving forward.
I can’t help but be reminded of the Orioles taking a hitting-light, defense-first college shortstop with a similar pick in 2018, then-Oregon State infielder Cadyn Grenier. He never made the majors. Better fortune to O’Ferrall. Maybe the Orioles think they can do something to unleash the power, or they believe O’Ferrall has enough of a chance to be a freak who is successful without power that it was worth taking him at this spot in the draft. It’ll be interesting to see how or if they work on his swing as a professional.
As is the Elias way, the Orioles passed on pitchers who were thought to be better overall talents in making this pick as well as the Honeycutt pick before them. University of Iowa pitcher Brody Brecht was on the board when the O’s selected this one. His profile sounded interesting to me, but the O’s let him pass twice. Brecht ended up being taken six picks later at #38 by the Rockies.
Over Mike Elias’s time with the Orioles, the team has done well in identifying future top 100 prospect-level talent with its second pick in a given draft. Gunnar Henderson, current top AL MVP contender, was picked right at the top of the second round. All-Star Jordan Westburg was chosen 30th in 2020. Connor Norby, who had some top 100 attention before last season if not this year, was a second rounder in 2021.
That pattern has been interrupted over the last couple of drafts, as neither Dylan Beavers (2022 #33) nor Mac Horvath (2023 #53) have managed to build that kind of prospect stock for themselves yet. The Orioles will be hoping that this pick goes more in a Westburg direction. It’s going to be hard to continue maintaining a strong farm system without hitting on later picks in the draft.
The Orioles received this pick in the draft as part of the prospect promotion incentive, a series of measures in baseball’s current CBA that is intended to reward teams for putting their best young players on the team at the start of the season. Henderson making the Opening Day roster last year and going on to win the Rookie of the Year award qualified the team for the pick.
The slot value of pick #32 is about $2.4 million. The Orioles went with a slot value-seeming player with their top pick and O’Ferrall seems like he is going to be more or less the slot value to sign as well, based on his positioning on most of the lists lining up roughly with where he was drafted.
As a last footnote to this pick: The Orioles had the #34 pick in the draft as part of this year’s Competitive Balance picks. Those picks are able to be traded, and the Orioles sent their pick to the Brewers in the Corbin Burnes trade. It’s looking likely that the O’s will get a similar pick back in next year’s draft after Burnes leaves as a free agent. For this year, the Brewers used that pick on University of Tennessee first baseman Blake Burke.
